Opera in Cinema

Thank you for your patience! Our Opera in Cinema Series at Camera 3 Entertainment is back with a new partner, Rising Alternative. And best of all, all productions are now screened as they were meant to be experienced -- in dazzling Sony Digital Cinema 4K (the highest resolution available) with Dolby 5.1 surround sound, in our spacious large auditorium.

Camera 3 Entertainment is located at 288 S. Second Street in the heart of downtown San Jose, Silicon Valley's center of arts and culture. See acclaimed new productions monthly of popular European based operas -- and sometimes ballets -- featuring the world's greatest stars and companies, Sundays at 12 noon with encore screenings the following Tuesday at 7:15pm.

Tickets are just $18.50, the lowest price for theatrical opera presentations in the South Bay. Partake in specialty coffees or beer and wine in the lobby before and after the show. And of course, we offer FREE validated parking in the attached, covered parking garage (just present your same day ticket purchase at the box office). Please note that these are special events, and no discount cards, group discount booklets, passes or re-admits will be accepted.

OPERA ScheduleClick on film title below to purchase tickets now, or purchase day of show at box office

April 12 (12 noon) & 14 (7:15pm)

Arabella (Strauss) -- Salzburg Festival
Genre:OPERA (new production)
Running time: 3 hrs., 15 mins (sung in German)
Conductor: Christian Thielemann
Director: Florentine Klepper
Cast: Renee Fleming, Thomas Hampson, Hanna-Elisabeth Muller, Daniel Behle, Albert Dohmen, Gabreila Benackova
Synopsis: A highlight of the 2014 Salzburg Easter Festival, this production of Arabella marks the first time Renee Fleming and Thomas Hampson have performed the opera together in its entirety. Ms. Fleming's performance in the title role has garnered enthusiastic acclaim, as the New York Times praises, she sings "with the plush sound, sublime lyricism, and dramatic subtlety that have endeared her to opera lovers." Strauss's opera captures the fleeting reverie of youth and Vienna's Golden Age through the romantic entanglements of two sisters. As Arabella finds the man of her dreams in Mandryka, this marriage is complicated by a case of mistaken identity and confused lovers. A comedy of errors in the pursuit of true love, Arabella is one of Strauss's most charming comedic operas.

May 10 (12 noon) & 12 (7:15pm)

Rigoletto (Verdi) -- Teatro Regio de Parma, Italy
Genre:OPERA (new production)
Running time: 2 hours, 10 mins (sung in Italian)
Conductor: Massimo Zanetti
Director: Stefano Vizioli
Sets and Costumes: Pierluigi Samaritani
Cast: Francesco Demuro, Leo Nucci, Nino Machaidze, Marco Spotti
Synopsis: Rigoletto is a tragedy of social injustice and inequality, evident through both the main character Rigoletto (the hunchbacked court jester, a typical Verdian character who oscillates between affection for his daughter and contempt for the Duke and his courtiers) and also in the implicit recreation of the nobility's lascivious lifestyle. An intense drama of passion, deceit, filial love, revenge and murder, Rigoletto perfectly combines melodic richness with dramatic power, both being features which characterize Verdi's opera masterpieces and ensure them a permanent place in the world's operatic repertoire.

June 21 (12 noon) & 23 (7:15pm)

Don Giovanni (Mozart) -- Salzburg Festival, Austria
Genre:OPERA (new production)
Running time: 3 hrs, 05 mins (sung in Italian)
Conductor: Christoph Eschenbach
Director: Sven-Eric Bechtolf
Cast: Lenneke Ruiten, Anett Fritsch, Valentina Nafornita, Ildebrando D'Arcangelo, Luca Pisaroni, Tomasz Konieczny, Andrew Staples, and Alessio Arduini
Synopsis: Viva la liberta! – In our time, comparatively devoid of taboos and free of shame, where what was once urgently advocated enlightenment has been degraded to profitable obscenity, a theatrical character such as Don Giovanni is harder to understand and to stage than ever before. It is his apparent proximity which leads to misunderstandings that are hard to unravel. Compared to the average porn-hardened twenty first century libertine, Don Giovanni is a romantic hero of metaphysical proportions. Sören Kierkegaard regarded him as an elemental force, related to Eros or Dionysus, an ancient God who owes his reawakening to the church. If the church reinforced the notion of the spirit, it did the same to sensuality by excluding it. If pleasure already existed in vegetable or animal form, then Christianity and the formulation of its opposite redefined it. To put it another way, the opera Don Giovanni – at least on stage – relies on a world which expresses its respect for sexuality through repression and does not devalue it by means of perverted liberalism and an economically-driven freedom from taboos.

July 12 (12 noon) & 14 (7:15pm)

Showboat (Kern/Hammerstein) -- San Francisco Opera (2015)
Genre:OPERA/MUSICAL (new production)
Running time: 2 hrs, 25 mins (plus one intermission)
Music: Jerome Kern
Book and Lyrics: Oscar Hammerstein II
Based on the novel Show Boat by Edna Ferber
Cast: Heidi Stober, Michael Todd Simpson, Bill Irwin, Patricia Racette, Angela Renee Simpson, Morris Robinson
Synopsis: A true classic of American musical theater, this tale of life on the Mississippi from the 1880s to the 1920s is a poignant love story and a powerful reminder of the bitter legacy of racism. Director Francesca Zambello's grand-scale production is "a triumph -- a stylish, fast-paced and colorful show that had the capacity audience on its feet, cheering loud and long" (Chicago Classical Review).

August 23 (12 noon) & 25 (7:15pm)

La Fille du Regiment (Donizetti) -- Vienna State Opera
Genre:OPERA (new production)
Running time: 2 hrs, 20 min (plus one intermission)
Conductor: Yves Abel
Director & Costumes: Laurent Pelly
Sets: Chantal Thomas
Lights: Joel Adam
>br>Orchestra: Orchester der Wiener Staatsoper
Cast: Natalie Dessay, Juan Diego Florez, Montserrat Caballe, Carlos Alvarez
Synopsis: Stratospheric soprano Natalie Dessay leads the charge in La Fille de Regiment, with superstar tenor Juan Diego Florez co-starring. Opera legend Monteserrt Caelle is featured as the Duchesse de Crakentorp. Pelly updates the story to the early 20th century and proceeds to send up the comic-opera genre with a frantic stream of visual highlights. In this outstanding performance, a Vienna State Opera co-production with the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and the Metropolitan Opera New York, the four world class singers are accompanied by the Wiener Philharmoniker who are led by Yves Abel.